Laura Chiaroni
SooS Chronicles
Florence, Italy
Laura Chiaroni was born is Prato in 1990 and now she lives and works in Florence as a freelance photographer.
She graduated from the three years course in Photography at L.A.B.A. (Libera Accademia di Belle Arti), Florence. Her interest focuses on documentary photography and reportage in which there is a very strong relationship between present and past, man and environment.
From 2010 she is a member of Blitz!, a team of young photographers. With Blitz! she runs collective and individual projects, photography courses, workshops and meetings. In 2011 started the collaboration with Archivio Fotografico Toscano, with the aim of enhancing the photographic local heritage.
During 2012 she started the ongoing project Standing Still together with the colleague Filippo Bardazzi.
From 2013 to 2015 Laura and Filippo worked on a documentary project about unconventional gas extractions in Europe.
Their images have been published both on Italian and international magazines (D – La Repubblica, Gente, Newsweek Japan, The Financial Times) and have been shortlisted and awarded in several photographic festivals worldwide (FoFu Phot'Art – Fucecchio, Premio Marco Pesaresi, Rovinj Photodays, Atkins CIWEM - London, Photo Kathmandu, Athens Photo Festival).
She is now working on documentary projects in Italy and Europe under the collective SooS Chronicles, founded with the photographer and journalist Filippo Bardazzi.
2015 - IPA – International Photography Awards, 2015 - Photo Kathmandu, 2015 - Rovinj Photodays, 2015 - Athens Photo Festival, 2015 - Premio Marco Pesaresi, 2015 - Atkins CIWEM EPOTY, 2015 - 7th Ed. of The Julia Margaret Cameron Award, 2015 - MIFA Photography Award, 2013 - IPA – International Photography Awards, 2013 - FoFu Phot’Art
- Arts
- Editorial
- Environment
- Landscape
- Portrait
- Reporting
Granitsa
Laura Chiaroni
Estonia’s recent past went through a severe process of Russification, started with Stalin in the 50s and ended just after the country achieved the independence in 1991. Since that moment the Estonian government has not yet been fully able to equalize the living conditions of the vast Russian minority to the country average. Today some of the ethnic Russians have chosen to embrace with hope a common future under the Estonian flag, but on the other side there is still a huge number of them who have maintained their Russian citizenship. Furthermore, another significant part of the ethnic Russians (6.8% of Estonia’s population, according to Amnesty International’s 2015 report) are not willing to face the controversial Estonian language and culture “citizenship test” and therefore are living in the Baltic country as stateless persons.
The Great Illusion
Laura Chiaroni
New opportunities in unconventional gas exploitation let Europe dream of lightening its dramatic dependence on Russian supplies. Fracking, or hydraulic fracturing, is the controversial method used to drill this type of gas. It is an invasive process that employs high-pressure water jets mixed with specific chemicals to break the shale rocks and to extract the gas contained in them. According to some studies, fracking would have serious consequences on the environment and it would require a strict regulation, which is still absent from the vague energy policy of the European Union.